2019 Africa Cup of Nations qualification

A total of 51 teams entered the tournament, including Cameroon which would have qualified automatically for the final tournament as the hosts before their hosting rights were stripped. The draw for the qualifications stage took place on 12 January 2017, 19:30 UTC+1, in Libreville, Gabon.^[3]

The teams were ranked using CAF's own system which calculated seeding based on each team's performance in the three most recent editions of the Africa Cup of Nations final tournaments, the three most recent editions of the Africa Cup of Nations qualifying campaigns, and the 2014 FIFA World Cup final tournament and qualifying campaign.^[4]

The teams ranked 1–45 (Pots 1–4) directly entered the group stage, while the teams ranked 46–51 (Pot 5) entered the preliminary round.

Pot	Rank	Team	Tournaments and weighting factor								Total
			2017 AFCON Q	2015 AFCON	2015 AFCON Q	2013 AFCON	2013 AFCON Q	2012 AFCON	2014 FWC	2014 FWC Q
			× 2	× 3	× 1	× 2	× 0.5	× 1	× 2	× 1
Pot 1	1	Ivory Coast	8	24	3	6	1.5	6	8	7	63.5
	2	Ghana	8	18	4	8	1.5	4	6	7	56.5
	3	Nigeria	6		2	16	1.5		12	7	44.5
	4	Algeria	8	9	4	2	1.5		12	7	43.5
	5	Tunisia	8	9	4	4	1.5	3		5	34.5
	6	Mali	8	6	3	8	1.5	4		3	33.5
	7	Burkina Faso	8	3	3	12	1.5	1		5	33.5
	8	DR Congo	8	12	2	4	1.5			2	29.5
	9	Cameroon	8	3	4		1		6	7	29
	10	Zambia	4	3	3	4	1.5	8		3	26.5
	11	Cape Verde	6	6	4	6	1.5			3	26.5
	12	Senegal	8	6	3o		1	1		5	24
Pot 2	13	Gabon	6	6	4		1	3		2	22
	14	Guinea	4	9	3		1	2		3	22
	15	Congo	6	9	3		0.5			3	21.5
	16	Equatorial Guinea	4	12			1	3		1	21
	17	South Africa	4	3	4	6				3	20
	18	Morocco	8			4	1.5	2		3	18.5
	19	Egypt	8		2		0.5			5	15.5
	20	Ethiopia	6		1	2	1.5			5	15.5
	21	Togo	6		1	6	1.5			1	15.5
	22	Angola	4		2	2	1.5	2		2	13.5
	23	Uganda	6		2		1			3	12
	24	Mozambique	6		2		1			2	11
Pot 3	25	Zimbabwe	8				1			1	10
	26	Libya	4				1	2		3	10
	27	Botswana	4		1		1	1		2	9
	28	Niger	2		1	2	1.5	1		1	8.5
	29	Benin	6				0.5			2	8.5
	30	Guinea-Bissau	8				0.5				8.5
	31	Malawi	2		2		1			3	8
	32	Sudan	2		1		1	3		1	8
	33	Sierra Leone[nb 1]	4		1		1			2	8
	34	Central African Republic	6				1			1	8
	35	Tanzania	4				0.5			2	6.5
	36	Burundi	6				0.5				6.5
Pot 4	37	Mauritania	6								6
	38	Eswatini	6								6
	39	Liberia	4				1			1	6
	40	Namibia	4				0.5			1	5.5
	41	Rwanda	4				0.5			1	5.5
	42	Lesotho	2		1					2	5
	43	Kenya	2				0.5			2	4.5
	44	Seychelles	4				0.5				4.5
	45	Gambia	2				0.5			1	3.5
Pot 5	46	Madagascar	2				0.5				2.5
	47	São Tomé and Príncipe	2				0.5				2.5
	48	South Sudan	2								2
	49	Comoros	2								2
	50	Djibouti	2								2
	51	Mauritius	2								2
No Pot	52	Chad[nb 2]					0.5				0.5
	53	Eritrea[nb 3]									0
	54	Somalia[nb 3]									0

Notes

The nine teams from Pot 4 were drawn in Groups D to L, while the twelve teams from each of the Pots 3, 2 and 1 were drawn in Groups A to L. Then, the six teams from Pot 5 were drawn into three pairings, which would play in the preliminary round. The three winners would advance to Groups A, B and C of the group stage.^[6]

The 48 teams were drawn into 12 groups of four teams (from Group A to Group L). They consisted of the 45 teams which entered directly, plus the three winners of the preliminary round whose identity was not known at the time of the draw.

The original host Cameroon was drawn into Group B. With the team guaranteed a spot in the finals regardless of its ranking in the group, its matches would have counted in determining the qualification of the other teams.

All group winners plus three best runners-up would have qualified for the finals. From Group B, if Cameroon had finished first or second, the other team placed in the top 2 would have qualified too and no other team would have been eligible to qualify, while if Cameroon had finished third or fourth, the group winner would have qualified and the runner-up would have been eligible to qualify as one of the three best runners-up.^[6]

On 20 July 2017, when the first round of the qualifying group stage had already been played, the final tournament was expanded from 16 to 24 teams. Under the new format, the best-placed team other than Cameroon would have qualified from Group B, while the group winners and runners-up would have qualified from all other groups.

On 30 November 2018 Cameroon was stripped of the hosting rights. The team lost its automatic spot for the finals but still could qualify through the qualification process, which it eventually did. On 8 January 2019 Egypt was named as the replacement host. As at that point Egypt had already been assured of a top 2 finish in Group J, the winners and runners-up from all qualification groups would now qualify for the final tournament.

Tiebreakers

The teams were ranked according to points (3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw, 0 points for a loss). If tied on points, tiebreakers were applied in the following order (Regulations Article 14):^[1]

1. Points in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
2. Goal difference in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
3. Goals scored in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
4. Away goals scored in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
5. If more than two teams were tied, and after applying all head-to-head criteria above, a subset of teams were still tied, all head-to-head criteria above were reapplied exclusively to this subset of teams;
6. Goal difference in all group matches;
7. Goals scored in all group matches;
8. Away goals scored in all group matches;
9. Drawing of lots.

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Senegal	6	5	1	0	12	2	+10	16	Final tournament		—	2–0	3–0	3–0
2	Madagascar	6	3	1	2	8	8	0	10			2–2	—	1–0	1–3
3	Equatorial Guinea	6	2	0	4	5	7	−2	6			0–1	0–1	—	1–0
4	Sudan	6	1	0	5	5	13	−8	3			0–1	1–3	1–4	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Morocco	6	3	2	1	8	3	+5	11[a]	Final tournament		—	2–0	3–0	1–0
2	Cameroon	6	3	2	1	6	3	+3	11[a]			1–0	—	1–0	3–0
3	Malawi	6	1	2	3	2	6	−4	5[b]			0–0	0–0	—	1–0
4	Comoros	6	1	2	3	5	9	−4	5[b]			2–2	1–1	2–1	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Mali	6	4	2	0	10	2	+8	14	Final tournament		—	0–0	2–1	3–0
2	Burundi	6	2	4	0	11	5	+6	10			1–1	—	1–1	3–0
3	Gabon	6	2	2	2	7	5	+2	8			0–1	1–1	—	3–0
4	South Sudan	6	0	0	6	2	18	−16	0			0–3	2–5	0–1	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Algeria	6	3	2	1	9	4	+5	11	Final tournament		—	2–0	1–1	1–0
2	Benin	6	3	1	2	5	6	−1	10			1–0	—	1–0	2–1
3	Gambia	6	1	3	2	6	6	0	6			1–1	3–1	—	0–1
4	Togo	6	1	2	3	4	8	−4	5			1–4	0–0	1–1	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Nigeria	6	4	1	1	14	6	+8	13	Final tournament		—	0–2	4–0	3–1
2	South Africa	6	3	3	0	11	2	+9	12			1–1	—	0–0	6–0
3	Libya	6	2	1	3	16	11	+5	7			2–3	1–2	—	5–1
4	Seychelles	6	0	1	5	3	25	−22	1			0–3	0–0	1–8	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Ghana	4	3	0	1	8	1	+7	9	Final tournament		—	1–0	5–0	Canc.
2	Kenya	4	2	1	1	4	1	+3	7			1–0	—	3–0	Canc.
3	Ethiopia	4	0	1	3	0	10	−10	1			0–2	0–0	—	1–0
4	Sierra Leone	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	Disqualified[a]		Canc.	2–1	Canc.	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Zimbabwe	6	3	2	1	9	4	+5	11	Final tournament		—	1–1	3–0	2–0
2	DR Congo	6	2	3	1	8	6	+2	9			1–2	—	1–0	3–1
3	Liberia	6	2	1	3	5	9	−4	7			1–0	1–1	—	2–1
4	Congo	6	1	2	3	7	10	−3	5			1–1	1–1	3–1	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Guinea	6	3	3	0	8	4	+4	12	Final tournament		—	1–1	1–0	2–0
2	Ivory Coast	6	3	2	1	12	5	+7	11			2–3	—	4–0	3–0
3	Central African Republic	6	1	3	2	4	8	−4	6			0–0	0–0	—	2–1
4	Rwanda	6	0	2	4	5	12	−7	2			1–1	1–2	2–2	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Angola	6	4	0	2	9	6	+3	12[a]	Final tournament		—	4–1	2–1	1–0
2	Mauritania	6	4	0	2	7	6	+1	12[a]			1–0	—	2–0	2–1
3	Burkina Faso	6	3	1	2	8	5	+3	10			3–1	1–0	—	3–0
4	Botswana	6	0	1	5	1	8	−7	1			0–1	0–1	0–0	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Tunisia	6	5	0	1	12	4	+8	15	Final tournament		—	1–0	1–0	4–0
2	Egypt[a]	6	4	1	1	16	5	+11	13			3–2	—	6–0	4–1
3	Niger	6	1	2	3	4	11	−7	5			1–2	1–1	—	0–0
4	Eswatini[b]	6	0	1	5	2	14	−12	1			0–2	0–2	1–2	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Guinea-Bissau	6	2	3	1	8	7	+1	9	Final tournament		—	1–0	2–2	2–1
2	Namibia	6	2	2	2	5	7	−2	8[a]			0–0	—	1–0	1–1
3	Mozambique	6	2	2	2	7	7	0	8[a]			2–2	1–2	—	1–0
4	Zambia	6	2	1	3	8	7	+1	7			2–1	4–1	0–1	—

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Uganda	6	4	1	1	7	3	+4	13	Final tournament		—	0–0	3–0	1–0
2	Tanzania	6	2	2	2	6	5	+1	8			3–0	—	1–1	2–0
3	Lesotho	6	1	3	2	3	7	−4	6			0–2	1–0	—	1–1
4	Cape Verde	6	1	2	3	4	5	−1	5			0–1	3–0	0–0	—

There were 348 goals scored in 146 matches, for an average of 2.38 goals per match.

7 goals

• Odion Ighalo

6 goals

• Fiston Abdul Razak

5 goals

4 goals

3 goals

2 goals

1 goal

1 own goal

• 32nd Edition Of Total Africa Cup Of Nations, CAFonline.com